Apple pregnacy care center’s message should remain on campus

The Apple Pregnancy Center, a non-profit pregnancy care center in Eau Claire promotes the exchange of knowledge by offering expectant parents an alternative to aborting their child.

The center opened its doors 32 years ago and has been serving expectant parents by providing them the resources they need to care for infants and toddlers.

The center receives donated diapers, maternity clothes, and financial support to serve
its clients.

Apple PCC is supported beyond their ability to retain the donations, Melinda Gardner, executive director of the center said.

Apple needs more office space and storage to take in cribs, high chairs, strollers and other things parents need, Gardner said.

“If someone’s not interested that’s fine, that’s not a problem,” she said. ”But we want to break some cycles and help and encourage people.”

Sophomore Anna Schwanebeck led a small movement against Crisis Pregnancy Centers such as Apple at UW-Eau Claire last week.

On Friday, to mark the end of a Week of Action rallying students against CPCs, Schwanebeck circulated a petition calling for the removal of Apple information
from campus.

If Schwanebeck succeeds in her mission, a link to Apple’s website on Eau Claire’s Activities, Involvement, and Leadership web page would be removed. The center’s display on the first floor of Hibbard would also be taken down.

By petitioning this information, she’s excluding an opposite viewpoint.

On a liberal campus such as Eau Claire, Schwanebeck and her followers are rejecting the values of a liberal education.

Schwanebeck claims CPCs are spreading medical falsehoods and the information they provide is straight up lying to students.

“Often CPCs don’t even have certified medical staff, but they will provide inaccurate medical information in order to manipulate women into avoiding all types of reproductive health care,” Schwanenbeck said in last week’s issue of The Spectator.

According to Mayo Clinic’s website, although abortion doesn’t generally cause sterility, rare cases can occur where complications cause an inability to conceive afterward without additional surgery.

The information that Apple PCC advertises on campus is a message of support to students who might be expecting.

For young people who find themselves in a crisis pregnancy, an advertisement offering support may be the answer they were seeking.

To deny the exchange of such information to any student due to a disagreement of viewpoint in regards to the dignity of human life is by no means advancing the goals of encouraging a liberal atmosphere for students to engage in.

Apple PCC’s information should remain on campus because it empowers students to think for
themselves.

The petition could strip a student’s ability to make independent choices. And that’s not what college is about.